


Cobalt & Gold

by Thalius



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Found: A Clone Wars Zine Entry, Gen, Improvised Dance Floors, Light Angst, Sieges, Wartime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-16 04:15:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29944350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thalius/pseuds/Thalius
Summary: Sieges were always brutal affairs, and the camp was in low spirits. Ahsoka enlists some help to cheer everyone up.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano
Comments: 7
Kudos: 96





	Cobalt & Gold

**Author's Note:**

> This is my entry for the [Found: A Clone Wars Zine](https://foundaclonewarszine.tumblr.com/)! There's an extra scene in here as well that didn't make the cut for the final piece.

Balancing on the balls of her feet and using the bulkhead above as a handhold, Ahsoka climbed towards the Admiral’s cabin. The dull, grey light that streamed through the massive rend in the ship’s hull above her acted as a guide as she gripped and tip-toed her way to the airlock door. The locking mechanism had long since died, but that was what her lightsabers were for.

Crossing the gulf between the rest of the deck and the cabin on the lone surviving support strut, she jumped off the beam and gave herself a boost with the Force to make the distance. She landed with a thud in front of the door, then a low, creaking groan followed.

“Hold,” she whispered, like a command, and used the broken door panel as a handhold while she waited for this slice of deck to stop making noise. When she was certain she wasn’t going to plummet to her death, Ahsoka let go of the panel and began to draw a large oval over the airlock with one of her sabers.

The searing slab of durasteel fell inwards with a kick, and she ducked inside the cabin, making sure her backpack didn’t bump against the molten edge of the hole she’d just made. Her spirits fell the moment she drew in breath; the air was thick with the smell of rotten food.

Ahsoka glanced over her shoulder, back towards the twisted innards of the ship. It had taken the better part of an hour just to get here, and heading back now with nothing in her pack felt like admitting defeat. 

She’d search the room, just in case.

It was much darker in the cabin than outside. Keeping her saber activated, the room was bathed in green light. However they’d moved this ship down into the yard, the Admiral’s cabin had survived more or less intact. The bed was still made, even if it was angled awkwardly towards the starboard wall. She paid the furniture no mind; she was here for rations.

But the _smell…._

Her eyes drew to the tiny, personal bar along the port wall. The counter was in one piece, if extremely dusty. She walked around it to the fridge tucked underneath its counter and saw that its door hung open. The rotten smell only got stronger. No insects had managed to get in, but they’d be feasting now that she’d opened the cabin.

“Maybe the cupboards,” she said to nobody, and pulled those open with one hand as she held up her saber in the other, looking around for anything edible. A granola bar, even. 

The first thing she found were three half-drunk bottles of liquor. Reading off the labels, she grabbed only one—the others were too low proof to be used as proper disinfectant. Ahsoka unslung her backpack and made space for it inside, which wasn’t hard. _Keep looking._

Not much else. A few plates, stir sticks, garnishing salt—she grabbed that. Empty ice trays, a mortar and pestle, and—aha! Two boxes of crackers. This _wasn’t_ a complete waste of time, after all.

There was a package of assorted tree nuts, too, which she grabbed, and some weird container of cereal grain. Maybe Anakin would know what it was.

As if her thoughts had conjured him, the comlink at her wrist blinked silently. Keying it on as she continued rooting around in the cupboards, she coughed to clear her throat. “Hey.”

_“Find anything?”_

“Not much,” she admitted, frowning down at the box of crackers in her hand. “I hope you like stale bar munchies.”

She expected a laugh. Instead only static answered her. Then, _“it’s better than nothing.”_

Ahsoka shoved the crackers in beside the liquor. “What about you? Find anything good?”

_“No,”_ he said curtly. _“Let’s head back.”_

“Everything okay?”

_“Great.”_

The channel clicked off. A moment later, she received his coordinates.

“Someone’s in a fun mood,” she muttered. 

Quickly packing away her meagre finds, Ahsoka searched the other cabinet, but there was nothing else. Not unless they could find a way to get nutritional value out of eating ceramic mugs.

The rest of the room was just as useless. Only a half-pack of cigarras tucked inside the Admiral’s bedside table gave her pause, and after a moment of deliberation, she took that, too. Maybe she could trade them with Jesse for one of his granola bars.

It took her another twelve minutes to reach Anakin’s position. He was on top of the frigate’s hull, near the southern end of the ragged seam that had been torn into the durasteel plating. She cleared the sharp edges with a Force-propelled jump and landed smoothly on the other side, taking a moment to make sure her footing was stable.

“Looks like it’s gonna rain again,” Ahsoka mused as she approached Anakin. He was looking out at the rest of the Separatist fleet grounded in the ship breaking yard, all in some state of horrible disrepair. It was a jagged and uneven graveyard.

“Yeah,” he said absently. She glanced at his pack; it sagged in on itself, completely empty.

She stopped beside him, placing a hand on his shoulder. He didn’t look down at her. “What’s wrong?”

Instead of answering, he fiddled with the comlink at his wrist. A small holographic display popped out from it—a list of men in the 501st, specifically Hazard Squadron. 

Her expression fell. All of their names were crossed out.

“None of them made it back?” she asked.

Anakin’s arm fell away, and the display went dark. “No.”

She took a deep breath, accepting their deaths, pushing away the guilt at how easy that was to do. “I mean… Rex said they probably wouldn’t.”

“And I sent them anyway.”

Her hand tightened on his shoulder, concerned at how despondent he sounded. “But the perimeter is still holding, right? They reinforced the eastern platoons?”

“Yes.”

Anakin’s eyes were far away. She knew he wouldn’t listen to her assurances right now. So she nudged his arm and gestured in front of them.

“Let’s head back,” she whispered. He nodded at that, saying nothing.

* * *

The air was misty by the time she and Anakin made it back to the northern encampment. The GAR-issued prefab barracks blended perfectly with the chaotic jumble of broken and beaten ships; they were piled so high in some places it was impossible to tell where the ground was. Their own camp was balanced atop the hull of a Confederacy destroyer, but it was littered with too many other smaller ships for Ahsoka to tell what damage had warranted burying it here in the first place.

Anakin made a beeline for one of the barracks, and she followed quickly behind. The air throbbed with his disaffected anger.

“Can we do some training?” she asked to his broad back, struggling to keep pace. His legs were so much longer than hers. “I want to practice the starting katas for Form Five—”

“Later, maybe,” was all he tossed over his shoulder, walking up the ramp to the barracks door. He ducked through the opening, and it shut behind him with a decisive, unwelcoming clang. 

Ahsoka closed her eyes and took a deep breath. He wasn’t upset with her; she knew that, deep down, but it was almost impossible not to inherit Anakin’s moods. His register in the Force was so commanding that it was difficult to distinguish which feelings were her own sometimes, especially when he was like this.

With a sigh she headed to the command tent. Maybe she’d ask Obi-Wan for help. He was usually better about keeping his bad moods to himself.

The walk was short. She followed the messy path past the barracks, her boots squelching in the mud wherever she stepped. Several troopers marched past her, their shoulders hunched and their heads hung low under their helmets, only jerking up to give her a passing nod. It wasn’t just because of the persistent rain, she knew. Everybody was exhausted. 

When she got to the command centre, she ducked under the tarped entrance. Obi-Wan and Commander Cody were braced over the holotable, frowning down at a topographic layout of the area. It was a complicated mess of jagged ships and craggy ravines—Bracca would be inhospitable even if it weren’t packed to the brim with decommissioned fighters and Confederacy destroyers.

Neither of them noticed her, talking furtively with one another as Cody gestured with the slice of his palm to a new potential scouting path in an eastern corridor. A Ghost Company trooper stationed by the door was the only one who acknowledged her presence, giving her a tired salute that she returned.

“Um,” she cleared her throat, and Obi-Wan looked up. “Master?”

“Find anything useful on your scouting run?” he asked, his mouth ticking up in a smile that she suspected was more out of habit than anything else.

“No, not really.” Ahsoka rolled her shoulders, feeling awkward. Obi-Wan was giving her his attention, but it was clear his mind was elsewhere. And while he was much better than his former Padawan at keeping an optimistic attitude in the middle of a siege, she could see how weary he was. “I was wondering if I could get some help with my katas. Anakin’s… um, busy.”

“Busy,” Obi-Wan echoed with a flick of his brow. “I see.” He opened his mouth to say more when his comlink flared to life, and he pulled his sleeve back to check the readout. “That’ll be Club Squadron reporting in. I’m sorry, Ahsoka, this is—”

“It’s okay,” she said, trying not to look too disappointed. “Do you know where Rex is?”

“Sleeping,” Cody said automatically, head cocked to listen to the report playing off Obi-Wan’s comlink. He shot her an apologetic look before turning his full attention to the general.

Ahsoka turned to leave—and then sidestepped when she heard a trooper running up to the door. It was Boil; he only narrowly avoided colliding with her as he skidded to a halt in the tent, and gave a breathless apology by patting her shoulder in passing.

“Commander, General—ah, Commander,” he added, nodding to Ahsoka in afterthought. “Some of the boys just reported another sighting of that Maw creature. I wanted to update the map….”

Ahsoka ducked back out into the rain, wrapping her arms around herself and heading off in a random direction so she would be out of the way. She clearly wasn’t needed in the command tent.

It was stupid to be upset; everyone was doing their best to keep things in working order. Two weeks of holding this shipyard without reinforcements or resupply was hard enough, but the Republic navy running siegebreakers in orbit against the Confederacy line was taking its toll. Everyone wanted this ship graveyard, and the Republic had already committed far too much for losing to be an option.

Ahsoka meandered around camp, watching troopers find cover from the increasingly biting rain and trying not to look too miserable. Blue and yellow armour mingled together, the only real source of colour in the shades of brown and grey. At first the 212th had been camped to the west, holding their perimeter at about fifty kilometres. But they’d been continually pushed back by rain, hunger, and the intermittent droid platoons sent down to the planet to give them grief, and now their staging grounds had collapsed back to the 501st’s position.

“How’s it looking, kid?”

Ahsoka turned at the voice and found Fives hiding under the protection of his helmet. He sounded as tired as everyone else did, but she sensed his smile.

“Great,” she muttered, holding up a hand to part the rain around her with the Force. “Everyone’s in a bad mood.”

“Just got done sulking myself,” he told her. “You wanna… play cards, maybe? I’m off duty for a while.”

Ahsoka pursed her lips, and glanced up at the vertical strip of red caution lights flickering in the sky. The control tower scraped the horizon behind them, rising far above the Confederate scrap that littered most of the continent. Everything about this place was dull and unwelcoming, the grey so pervasive it was hard sometimes to tell where the ships ended and the sky began. It was getting to everyone, herself included. She couldn’t do anything to speed up the orbital siege, or even stop them from losing more men, but... maybe there were other ways she could help.

“You can just say no if you don’t want to,” Fives groused, pulling her attention back to him. When she grinned, he cocked his head. “What?”

“I have an idea,” she said. “But I need your help.” 

* * *

“You know,” Fives grunted, “I can just use—a ladder—”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Ahsoka called, keeping her hands steady in the air as she held him about twenty metres above her. “And you’re doing a great job.”

She thought she heard him mutter something about being patronised, but it was hard to tell over the rain. It was pelting down on the tarps they’d clipped up overhead, making it the driest place in the camp—and the noisiest.

“Diamond is a better artist than me,” Fives was saying, slashing the paint brush she’d given him across a blank section of the shorn bulkhead. “These are just lines.”

“Do you want to help or not?”

“I’m just saying,” he shot back, and frowned down at her. “Best bang for your buck.”

“Well I don’t want Diamond,” she said, and then lowered him down gently to the ground. He let out a breath of relief when his boots touched rusty steel. “I want you.”

He gave her a genuine smile at that. “Flatter me some more and I’ll paint the next line.”

Ahsoka punched his arm. “You’re the only person in this place who’s in a decent mood,” she told him. “And you’re cooler than Diamond.”

He puffed himself up, preening a little. “Glad you’ve finally realised the truth.”

Ahsoka grinned. “Now it’s time for the next section.”

“Do _not_ lift me up again—”

She did, several times, passing Fives around the little section of camp near the southern edge that they’d claimed as their own. There were technically supposed to be guards stationed here, but even without checking the duty roster she knew they didn’t have enough men for that. It worked to their benefit anyway; she wanted everything to be perfect before anybody else saw what they were doing.

Especially if they were going to get yelled at for it.

“What next?” Fives said in an annoyed huff once she put him back down.

Ahsoka appraised his work, tapping her lip. “It’s a start,” she murmured. “But it’s still too dark and dingy in here.”

“There’s some strut lights in the storage prefab,” he suggested. “Have to smuggle them all the way here, though.”

“I can take care of that,” she assured him. “Just keep painting.”

“Painting _what?”_

“Whatever you feel like!” she called over her shoulder, already running for the lights.

It was easy enough to move unnoticed throughout the camp; people were too busy with their own work, or simply being grumpy, to pay her any mind. But just to be safe, Ahsoka walked along the bulkheads and support beams far above where anyone would think to look.

A few minutes later, she was slipping into the storage prefab and grabbing an armful of strut lights. They were supposed to be used to mark perimeters, but their routes had shrunken in so drastically that there was almost no need for them. 

“Heavy,” she grunted, adjusting them in her grip. She was carrying a little over a dozen; hopefully enough to light everything up. Now the challenge was to get back without being noticed—at least, not by anyone who would ask her what she was up to.

“What are you up to?”

Ahsoka jolted, whipping around in surprise. A pole slipped from the bundle under her arm and clanged to the floor, narrowly avoiding slamming into Rex’s calf, who was filling up the doorway.

“Rex, hi.” She gave him a smile. “Have a nice sleep?”

“No,” he replied, crossing his arms. “Why are you in here?”

“Why are you?” she countered.

He wiggled the mug in his hand. “Looking for a caf packet,” he replied curtly, and then glanced down at the strut by his feet. “What are those for?”

“A project,” she explained, hefting the bundle in her arm further up and calling the dropped pole back with a flick of her fingers. It was damp from the water tracked on the floor. “Do you want to help?”

He raised a brow. She could sense his unease—the built-in wariness of a man who was supposed to object to any and all irregularities his men displayed. But Ahsoka was no ordinary trooper, and she could feel his curiosity tempering his better judgement.

“With what, exactly?” he finally asked.

“A morale-boosting initiative,” she said, and his mouth finally broke its firm line to tick up at her word choice. “To cheer everyone up.”

“With perimeter lights?”

“I’m only gonna explain if you’re in.”

“If I’m ‘in’,” he echoed skeptically, the frown returning. “And what if I’m not?”

“If not, then don’t be a snitch,” she said, trying to sound commanding. But that didn’t really work on Rex. “Please.”

He scrubbed a palm across the fuzz on his head as he considered her proposal. “I do have work to do, you know. And so do you, if I remember right.”

“Paperwork can wait for another hour,” she reasoned, shifting the bundles under her arm again. “Or two. Come on, it’ll be fun.”

His shoulders drooped with a sigh. “Guess I could get Fives to cover for me.”

“Uh....” 

His frown was wary again. “What?”

“I’ll explain on the way. Help me carry this stuff,” she added. “I need a few more things from in here.”

* * *

“You should sleep, sir.”

“I will,” Obi-Wan said automatically, and Cody’s answering frown told him exactly how little the commander bought his promise. “In a few hours.”

Sieges always confounded his sleep schedule. He tried to keep the amount of rest he needed to a minimum, supplementing it instead with meditation, but it was difficult to meditate on a battlefield. 

“Next party shouldn’t be back until eighteen-thirty,” Cody reported. They both knew that already; this was just his way of pressing the issue. “I can keep a handle on things in here.”

“I have no doubt you will,” Obi-Wan replied tiredly, and then scratched at his beard with a sigh. “I’m sorry, that was terse. Perhaps I should—”

He paused, looking towards the entrance of the tent; he could feel Anakin approaching, and he was not in a good mood. 

Cody frowned. “What?”

His question was answered when Anakin pushed inside the tent with a huff. 

“Good afternoon,” Obi-Wan said diplomatically, watching his former Padawan cast about the room with a glare. It didn’t help that he was slouched over to keep from brushing his head against the roof of the tent.

“What the hell,” Anakin muttered, ignoring Obi-Wan’s greeting, and threw his hands up. “Have you seen Ahsoka? Or Rex? Or anyone, for that matter?”

Cody exchanged a worried look with him, and Obi-Wan frowned. “Ahsoka was in here earlier, but that was—” He looked at his chrono. “A few hours ago. Have you tried raising them?”

“No, because I didn’t think I’d _need_ to in our own camp.” The words were ground out as Anakin pulled up his comlink, jabbing a finger across the control pad. “Ahsoka,” he said sharply when it blinked green. “Where are you?”

_“Hi, Master!”_ she replied, far cheerier than she had any right to be. It did not improve Anakin’s overcast mood. _“I’m working on something. I should be done soon.”_

“What ‘something’?”

_“It’s a secret—”_

“Is that Rex?”

The comm crackled, and Obi-Wan could hear muttered voices over the line.

_“Yeah,”_ she said after a minute. _“I ordered him to help me, so don’t be mad at him. Fives is here, too.”_ There was a pause, followed by a loud clatter and a string of curses. _“Uh, gotta go, bye!”_

The connection winked off. Anakin looked up, incredulous, and met Obi-Wan’s eyes. “Can you believe this?”

“Oh, easily,” he replied, his mouth twitching. “I see your Padawan takes closely after you.”

“Don’t start.” Anakin slicked back his damp hair and heaved a sigh. “Guess I’ll go find her.”

Obi-Wan glanced at Cody. “Care for a walk? This could be interesting.”

The commander shrugged, equally amused. “Sure, why not.”

The hunt was an easy one. Ahsoka took no measures to hide her excitement, and amidst the grey and gloom, her bright energy shone like a beacon in the Force. It had a precipitating effect on Obi-Wan’s mood, even beyond simple empathy—she seemed in low spirits when she’d come to him in the tent, and he’d been too busy to even feel guilty for brushing her off.

Anakin was not so easily swayed, however. “She took all my commanding officers off duty with her,” he was muttering. “Didn’t tell me where she went. She’s probably doing something dangerous—”

“Yes, it is a hassle, isn’t it?”

Anakin shot him a glare. “This is different.”

“Ah,” Obi-Wan hummed, thoroughly amused. “Different. I see.”

“I never pulled these kinds of stunts in the middle of a warzone,” Anakin reminded him.

“No,” Obi-Wan agreed. “Only during highly sensitive diplomatic engagements, or training lessons, or formal ceremonies—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Anakin interrupted him, still unyielding. Then he frowned at the encampment they were coming up on. “What is she....”

It took Obi-Wan a second to realise what he was looking at. Ahsoka appeared to have used every spare tarp in the camp to protect a portion of the destroyer’s hull from the rain, creating a haphazard, lumpen tent, the tarps tied off to jagged pieces of scrap metal and other astral detritus that had found a home here. Sensing their arrival, Ahsoka shoved through a split in one of the tarps to welcome them.

“Hi, Master! And Obi-Wan,” she added, still chipper, “and Cody.”

“Is that paint on your face?” Obi-Wan asked, bemused.

“Oh?” She wiped a hand on her cheek, smearing blue across her skin. “Maybe.”

“What are you doing, Ahsoka?” Anakin demanded.

She beamed at them, and even Anakin softened at her bright smile. “Come inside and see!”

Ahsoka ducked back inside before any of them could object. Exchanging confused looks, they followed after her. 

Obi-Wan was once again disoriented when they entered, this time by all the colour. The inside of her tent was almost painfully vibrant, with nearly every surface covered in stripes of cobalt and gold, no doubt borrowed from the armour paint the clones used on their plastoid kits. Reflective light patches were interspersed with the stripes of paint, placed along the edges of scrap metal near the roof of the tent. They sparkled from the strut lights, dazzling in the gloom. 

In the centre of the tent was the main spectacle; a small make-shift dais, atop which was one of Ahsoka’s lightsabers stuck to the end of a perimeter light pole. The dais was covered in more reflective patches, angled upwards to catch the cool green light from her saber and throwing it up onto the roof of the tent. Looking up at the tarp, Obi-Wan couldn’t help but grin; she’d painted little figures on the reflective patches, appearing as grand shadows cast in green on the surface of the tarp.

“Everyone’s been kinda grumpy lately,” Ahsoka explained, shifting nervously when no one spoke. “I wanted to do something to cheer people up.”

“You did this by yourself?” Anakin asked, eyes cast up at the roof tarp as he walked slowly towards the centre of the tent.

“Fives and Rex helped a bunch,” she said, gesturing to them behind her. “I couldn’t have done it without them.” 

“Right.”

“So…” she hummed, “what do you think?”

Obi-Wan cast his eyes above him once more, studying the little shadows carefully. Some were just the names of clones, some were errant doodles made by an idle hand, and some were actual figures. He spotted a clone trooper helmet, Anakin’s lightsaber hilt, and a deceptively cute rendition of the large Maw creature that lived in the ravines of Bracca, its many mouths smiling and tentacles curled in welcome.

“I think it’s a huge strain on our limited resources,” Anakin began, appraising the set-up with a critical eye. “You distracted two senior officers to get this done, not to mention skipping your own duties. It’s entirely un-regulation….” He trailed off, looking back at Ahsoka, who had deflated at his words. But Anakin was grinning now. “And I love it.”

She brightened back up again instantly and hopped towards him, bowling into his midsection to give him a fierce hug that made him grunt in surprise. 

“I’m glad,” she whispered, and then pulled back to grin at him. “Fives has music, too. I thought we could dance. If you want.”

She snuck a look at Obi-Wan, perhaps for reassurance, or to gauge whether he’d object to such a frivolous use of their time. Which it was, but it would be unforgivably cruel to voice that objection. So instead he smiled back at her, and felt her answering warmth blossom like a small sun.

“I could go for a dance,” Anakin mused, and glanced at Obi-Wan. “Think your knees can handle it, old man?”

“I’m not old,” he objected, a correction that fell on uncaring ears. “But yes, I can spare a few minutes.”

“Yes!” Ahsoka bounced back towards the centre of the encampment, fists pumping. “I get first dibs with Rex!”

Rex backed away towards Fives. “I’m not dancing—”

“Yes you are,” Anakin said, using his general voice. 

“Um, sir,” Cody whispered beside Obi-Wan. “I don’t want to be a downer, but—”

“You don’t have to subject yourself to this if you don’t want,” Obi-Wan assured him. “You may do it later, if you wish.”

Cody narrowed his eyes. “Or never.”

“And disappoint Ahsoka?”

Cody looked in her direction. She was trying to convince Rex that dancing wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, and remarkably seemed to be making some headway. Obi-Wan suspected it had more to do with his admiration for the girl than any genuine enjoyment of dancing. 

The commander sighed. “Later,” he muttered. “Maybe. After I finish my shift.”

“Later,” Obi-Wan said, patting his pauldron. “Best make your escape now, Commander. I think the music is about to begin.”

Cody didn’t need to be told twice. He ducked out of the tent and hurried back to the command centre, sighing in relief.

Sure enough, the small radio Ahsoka had placed beside to dais began to belt out music, and only after being counselled by Rex to not make too much noise did she turn it down.

Anakin sidled up beside him, a grin now permanently etched on his face. It made him look like the young man he still was. “Wanna be dance partners?”

“Aren’t we always?” Obi-Wan replied, and held out a hand to his former Padawan.


End file.
